Posts filed under 'Publicity'
Yesterday I got to be the in-studio guest at BBC Radio Berkshire to talk about my involvement with the Clipper Race. Amazingly I wasn’t even a tiny bit nervous, I just found it fascinating how many computer monitors a single DJ has to look at all at the same time.
Here’s the link - you just need to forward to about 2.11 otherwise you’ll be sitting through a 3 hour show.
I’m also pleased to say that our pictures are now at last live on the Clipper website - you can see them here. These are the people (well not all of them as we can only fit 18 of us on at a time) that I’ll be spending 6 weeks of my life with in a 68 foot long space. Big Brother may have been axed, but this is its replacement show.
Tomorrow we’re off for a very last minute, very nasty Haven holiday type affair for the bank holiday weekend. I was supposed to be doing media training for the race, but it’s the last weekend we’ll all have together as a family without birthday parties and imminent race starts to contend with. So I thought ‘Sod it.’ It’s going to be cheese-tastic and I feel we might have to take a lot of wine with us to get through it, but the kids will love it.
I’ve also made my final purchases for the race - including the highly recommended yet excrutiatingly priced Elizabeth Arden 8 hour cream which apparently cures/solves a multitude of skin ailments likely to occur at sea.
All that’s left to do is the pre-leaving home logistics. That will take an entire blog post of its own.
On Monday the boys and I will head down to Gosport to bid the boats farewell as they make their way up to Hull. The excitement is definitely building now…
Tags: BBC Radio Berkshire, Clipper, fame
August 27th, 2009
This is the coffee mug that has kept me fuelled with caffeine and motivation all week as I’ve worked till midnight every night to clear the decks. Because this weekend I head off for my first sailing training. I’ve not had time to go over the training manual again. I’ve not had time to ensure I have the right kit. And I’ve not had time to do any exercise. So not brilliant preparation for it, but I shall keep calm and carry on.
Wish me luck. I’m about to discover why I’m working every spare hour there is.
PS - This also appeared in the local paper yesterday.
Tags: keep calm and carry on, sailing, Training
April 3rd, 2009
I haven’t sailed off into the sunset just yet. I’m still here, just a leetle teeny bit frenetic so blogging has had to take a back seat (as has twittering, facebooking, exercising, housecleaning and cooking).
My fund-raising plans are now well underway, with two big events planned. Firstly, I’ll be holding a Nearly New Sale on 9 May. This isn’t just a good way for me to raise money, it also means that I can at last get rid of all the piles of baby stuff loitering in corners of the house but which I can’t bear to just put in the recyling bin. Thanks to the kind help of some of the pre-school mummies - especially Caroline - it’s starting to come together although I still need more sellers not to mention plenty of buyers!
Secondly, I’ll be holding a girly tea party in a marquee in our garden on 13 June. Many of my lovely clients and people I’ve worked with have agreed to donate some prizes for a raffle or auction including Fink Cards, Babylicious, Darling & Darling and Cuddledry. There will be tea, cake, champagne, bunting and general girly loveliness. Just a shame I’ll be too busy rushing around like an insaniac doing everything to actually sit down and nibble on dainty sandwiches.
If anyone lives remotely close to Newbury, Berkshire and is interested in attending either of these events, please let me know! And if anyone else would like to donate a prize for the auction, shout! I shall swoon and kiss you and generally sing your praises. Plus, if that’s not enough, you’ll be able to put out flyers about your business for all the mummies to look at.
A big thanks also to Babycentre for being the first corporate to sponsor me. Please go visit the Babycentre site - particularly if you don’t know anything about babies. Type a random question you may have about children into the search tool and the site is almost guaranteed to have an answer. It’s a mine of useful information, particularly if you have children like mine who didn’t come with a guide book.
I’ve also made some headway on the press front - I’ll be on Mybabyradio.com this Thursday between 1 and 2 pm. And hopefully the local paper will run the piece they came to take a picture for several weeks ago. I’ve now added a press page to this blog to keep track of all the latest news.
Lastly, my training manual has arrived. OMG. I know how to sail and I’m daunted by the amount of info I need to bone up on before I head off for my first training course on 5 April. I think if they sent the training manual out before you signed up, no-one would do it. There are whole sections, for example, that deal with how to handle sea sickness and how to avoid the spread of germs on the boat and how not to set fire to the boat and how to send out a Mayday signal if you do indeed set fire to the boat.
My brain has barely any room left in it. I’m not sure how I’m going to squeeze this all in. Not to mention that I’ve just discovered that besides the first 3 weeks training I have to do, there’s a 4th week of pure theory. I thought that was at home study but apparently not. So somehow I need to fit that in too. Oh, and that involves meteorology and navigation. I assume from that, that it’s not as simple as just plugging in: ‘Rio’ to a satnav and setting sail.
I shall fill you in further as I delve deeper into the manual. And I know I still owe you the next installment in my sailing history: The teen years including bad hair pics. It’s coming. Eventually.
Tags: babycentre, babylicious, cuddledry, darling&darling, finkcards, fund-raising, mybabyradio, press, sailing
March 17th, 2009
It is award season after all so just pretend that I’m wearing a Dior creation with some Harry Winston bling in my ears, clutching a golden statue. I’m not doing a Kate Winslet breathy, teary, OTT type thank you speech, just something a little more demure. So here it is:
Thanks to some lovely people out there, the word about my mad mission is spreading and I’m slowly starting to make tiny inroads into the obstacles that lie ahead.
So here are some thank yous:
Welsh girl - for writing this lovely post. Here’s wishing her luck in her own personal mission: finding love via the internet. Read her blog to find out hilarious (and OMG does that really happen) stories about some of the delightful dates she’s had. Hats off to cravat man as the world’s most obnoxious date.
Katyboo - for writing this hilarious and very kind post and for trying to find many other avenues to help me get publicity. If you’ve never read Katy’s blog, please do yourself a favour and read it. Particularly if you’re having a down in the dumps type of day. It is guaranteed to have you laughing out loud (just make sure to wear incontinence pads).
Jo at Mummo - her blog Mummonia is just one of the things Jo does. Jo is a woman on a mission to help mums get their lives in balance (another believer that there’s more to life than laundry!) She’s set up a social networking site for mums - and she’s the brains behind a really impressive campaign that will be announced on Mother’s Day. And now she’s had the idea to come up with the Mum and More awards.
Susannah who runs Thames Valley Mums bloggers and British Mummy Bloggers also kindly mentioned the blog.
EJ is one of the mummies whose children go to the same pre-school as mine. She also happens to be a personal trainer and she kindly gave me some of her time for free to create some training exercises to help me get fit. I’m not 100% sure I should be thanking her actually, given that I did them all yesterday and today cannot move. Walking down stairs is an impossibility. I feel I have a way to go before I’m ready to tackle the high seas.
My lovely friend Emma who recently traded Plymouth for a sandier backyard by moving to Abu Dhabi, raided her contacts book and put me in touch with some great companies who will hopefully fancy sponsoring a mum who’s lost her tenuous grasp on sanity.
Andrew, who runs the MyChieveley website, kindly gave my blog a mention too. While Caroline, another pre-school mum, has offered her fund-raising expertise.
The ‘get off the stage’ music has started to play so I’ll leave it there but really just wanted to say a big thank you to everyone who has helped me so far including all the other bloggers who’ve given me words of encouragement. It’s all feeling a bit daunting at the moment so all the help is greatly appreciated.
Tags: bloggers, friends, thank you
February 22nd, 2009
